2024 Defensive Personnel Failures

[*ochocincos*]

It's no secret the biggest contributor for this letdown of a season is the defense.
They did allow a ton of yards last year (31st in yards allowed) but 21st in Point Allowed.
Compare that to 2022 when they were 6th in Points Allowed, 16th in Yards Allowed.
However, they've hit a new low with some key veteran departures and new guys replacing them - 31st in Points Allowed, 27th in Yards Allowed.

Key changes in 2024:
Rankins - Basically a waste of a signing. He may not quite be on the level of Trae Waynes bad signing, but he's gotta be up there.
Stone - Dude can't cover for s**t, nor tackle. 16 missed tackles, 103.7 passer rating allowed. While Hill was also bad in coverage last year, he didn't have nearly as many missed tackles.
Bell - A shell of himself. Should have left Battle starting at SS the entire season and maybe have Bell as backup or something.
Jenkins - Kind of a letdown for a 2nd round DT. He's doing ok, but not offering much pass rush. Only 7 total pressures in 177 pass rush reps.
Jackson - Preseason injury slowed his progression, but he has 6 total pressures on 80 pass rush reps.

The Awuzie departure is also apparent, at least with Hill and Turner now both out.
CTB has abruptly declined, allowing a 128.1 passer rating and 15.4 yards per reception.
Newton simply was not ready to fill in as a 4th round rookie.

The last problem is DL growth of current dudes.
Hubbard has taken a big step back. While he was never a sack artist, he was normally good for 6-8 a year. He's at just 2.0 through 12 games. Age and injuries might be catching up to him.
Murphy has been invisible in his 2nd year, not having registered a single sack through 8 games.
Ossai may be starting to come on late, having registered 2 sacks the past 2 games but 0 in the first 10 games.
Bengals also did not get any growth from Zach Carter, ultimately resulting in his release this year, his 3rd season.
Amusingly, Carter signed with LV after his release and he's played in 3 games, already registering a sack for LV at DE.
Maybe he just couldn't ever grow into a true 4-3 DT like we hoped and is better at DE.

I'm sure talent identification is part of the problem because of the guys that were added, but there's also a clear problem with talent development.
Guys like Murphy, Carter, and Ossai had shown some raw talent in college, but they needed refinement by NFL coaching to get them to their ceilings.
Guys like Rankins and Stone were just flat out bad fits for what the team needed. Stone's lack of speed and athleticism were never going to fit in Anarumo's defense. Rankins was in no way, shape, or form a replacement for Reader.

Hopefully we see the team willing to part ways with Rankins and Stone this offseason and put that toward a couple better fits for immediate FA contributors.
And then they need to get a couple promising pass rushers on the DL in the draft to go along with it.
Some coaches need replaced as well though, as they've been given a few years and haven't gotten any improvements.